Arrests - continuation of the stroke

Five Belarusian journalists were detained on charges of unauthorized access to information

On Tuesday morning, employees of the Investigative Committee of Belarus, accompanied by OMON, came to the editorial office of the TUT.BY portal and the Belapan news agency. In the Minsk business center Omega Tower on Dzerzhinsky Avenue, where the TUT.BY office is located, several floors were cordoned off. Belapan journalists were not allowed to work. The reason is the criminal case of unauthorized access to computer information, perfect from “other personal interest, which entailed causing significant harm” (Article 349, part 2 of the Criminal Code of Belarus).

Investigators came home and home to the chief editor of TUT.BY Marina Zolotova, editors of the same portal Anna Kaltygina, Ulyana Boboed, Galina Ulasik and the observer Belapan Tatyana Korovenkova. All of them, according to the Investigative Committee in their press release, were detained on suspicion of committing a crime. So far, for three days, then they must either be charged or release from custody.

The reason, as it turned out, was the statement of the General Director of the State Information Agency of BelTA Irina Akulovich to law enforcement agencies about unauthorized access to the materials of the agency paid. Allegedly, in 2017-2018, more than 15 thousand connections to information, the owner of which is BelTA. And then the guilty are found, investigators work with them.

All this looks very strange for several reasons.

Firstly, the difference between a paid and free version of BelTA is 15 minutes. That is, subscribers of a paid version who pay 612 rubles per month for it (about $ 300), receive information 15 minutes before it appears on the site in the public domain. And there is no point in hacking the site in order to find out 15 minutes earlier to find out the volume of boring in the Mogilev region. And besides boring and official information, BelTA State Agency does not publish anything.

Would you hack the TASS news report for 1973 to be the first to find out about the successes of the sowing?

Secondly, if the journalists of Belapan and TUT.BY used the official information of BelTA, then always with laid links and hyperlinks, observing all the rules of good tone and copyright on the Internet.

Thirdly, journalists, even commanding, do not write denunciations to each other. But if you are the head of the state propaganda enterprise, then you are obliged to comply with orders. Oral, given to the "turntable". And if they are ordered to write a donos statement? In this case, it seems that this happened.

Fourth, Article 349 is not a “country”. The maximum punishment for it is two years of imprisonment. According to the Code of Criminal Procedure of Belarus, detention applies only to the accused of crimes, for which punishment of imprisonment for a term of more than two years is provided. Thus, the investigators did not have the right to detain five journalists even with formal suspicion. True, the exact number of detainees is still unknown - some journalists are simply lacking in the morning of Tuesday. The owner of the TUT.BY portal Yuri Zisser claims that in reality there may be more.

UPDATE
It became known that two more TUT.BY journalists were detained: Anna Ermachenok and Dmitry Bobrik.

As, however, the versions of what is happening in reality. It is clear that the point is not a paid subscription of Bett. Unless the state decided with the help of its usual methods instead of subsidies for the State Agency to force everyone to subscribe to their tape so that official information is in every peasant hut. Perhaps journalists will “process” special services with their goals for three days. Perhaps the state looked at the profitable TUT.BY, and we are observing the first stage of the raider seizure. However, it seems to me the most correct version of the editor -in -chief of the Charter'97 site Natalia Radina:

“It seems that there is a strip of information space in front of the upcoming serious events. I urge all journalists to solidarity. ”

If we take into account that the searches and arrests of journalists were a continuation of the stubborn rumors about the stroke of Alexander Lukashenko, who were thrown into the information field all past week with enviable perseverance, then searches and arrests may turn out to be a revenge on the active discussion of a possible stroke in the Belarusian media, and ideological preparation for some new events: Lukashenko is completely bad, other people will come here, and other people will come here, and other people and other people and other people. Information stripping is already for them.